Chapter Thirteen
Darcy did not go directly home from Gracechurch Street.
He walked instead, for the better part of an hour, through streets he scarcely registered, turning over the conversation he had just had and the larger reckoning it had set loose in him, until he found himself, without entirely intending the destination, standing before his own writing desk with a fresh sheet of paper before him and no clear notion, yet, of what he meant to write upon it.
He had promised Elizabeth he would speak to his aunt, and he meant to keep that promise, would write to Lady Catherine before the day was out, in terms as firm as respect for an elder relation permitted.
But it was not that letter his hand reached for first. It was, instead, a letter to Elizabeth herself, though he had seen her not three hours before and had no urgent occasion to write again so soon.
He began it three times before the fourth attempt satisfied him enough to continue past the first paragraph.
Dear Miss Bennet,
I write to you again so soon after our conversation this morning not from any urgent necessity, for I intend to address the matter of my aunt directly and will inform you of the outcome as soon as I have one to report, but because I find, upon reflection, that there remains something I did not say to you today which I believe requires saying, and which I could not find the courage to speak aloud in your aunt's parlour with the whole weight of propriety and observation pressing upon the conversation.
You asked me nothing today, Miss Bennet, beyond the single request regarding Mrs. Collins, and I honoured you for the restraint, for I know you might, with perfect justice, have demanded a great deal more of me by way of explanation or apology than the little time allotted us permitted.
But I find I owe you a fuller account than what circumstance allowed this morning, and so I set it down here, where I may take whatever care the matter deserves without the constraint of a clock ticking toward the end of a permitted visit.
I have turned over, these three weeks, every particular of my own conduct that led us both to this present difficulty, and I find myself returning, again and again, to a single truth I did not fully understand about myself before Hunsford: that I had mistaken reserve for integrity, and pride for principle, for so long that I no longer knew the difference between the two.
You showed me that difference, Miss Bennet, in words I did not enjoy hearing but have come, since, to value above nearly every other lesson I have received in the whole course of my life.
I do not ask your forgiveness in this letter, for I do not believe forgiveness is owed simply because it is requested, and I would rather earn it slowly, through conduct rather than correspondence, than solicit it cheaply through fine words upon a page.
I ask only that you believe this: whatever comes of the present difficulty, whatever Lady Catherine decides regarding Mr. Collins's living, whatever further consequence the gossip yet produces for either of us, I do not regret the reckoning Hunsford forced upon me, however painful its arrival.
I am a better man for having been shown myself clearly, even at the cost of showing myself to you first in the least flattering light I have ever worn before another person.
I remain, with a regard that has only deepened rather than diminished through every difficulty of these past weeks, your most sincere and humble servant,
Fitzwilliam Darcy
He sat a long while after finishing it, the pen still in his hand, reading it over with the particular scrutiny he applied to every important document, searching for some phrase too presumptuous, some sentiment too boldly stated for a correspondence not strictly sanctioned by the ordinary rules of courtship.
He found several such phrases. He sent the letter regardless, understanding, as he sealed it, that the whole of the last month had taught him something his earlier self would have found difficult to credit: that the careful management of appearances, the government of what others believed of him, mattered a great deal less than the simple, unguarded truth of what he actually felt, spoken plainly to the one person whose good opinion he had come, at last, to value above every other consideration in his life.